It's Grim Oop.....

It's an interesting clubhouse that is forced to put up a sign saying "Do Not Spit in the Showers". At least, I fervently hope that that was a 'p' and not an 'h' - it wasn't clear due to the brown smudging around the edges.

I'd secretly been hoping to get a 5k PR at the Mansfield 5k although my confidence was tempered a bit by some proper Northern weather (rain and wind) and a course that had very few flat portions. My PR is a very modest 16:30 set a few years ago and as my recent 3k projects out to a sub 16:00 5k I was reasonably confident of at least going close, despite my poor stamina. Yet again, however, I felt my energy gradually leeching away during the race to the extent that by the end my legs had become comatosed and useless. My final time of 17:13 was pretty pathetic but that's about all I had, which is very disappointing. As the final slap in the face I got overtaken by a young lady so I came in as 19th male and 20th person!

In hindsight this will perhaps be the most useful result of the season. I'd had a suspicion that I'd backed off threshold and long runs much too early - partly because of a knee injury, partly because of the compressed year and crucially about 5 ill-timed hangovers. Next year I will make it a priority to ensure a long and deep base period and to carry on with the stamina work into the competitive phase of the year. There's no point having a good sprint finish if you are 600m behind the leaders near the line! I wonder what I could have run over 800m this year if I'd kept my stamina up to par......

Today is the final day of the season for me and it's back to a more realistic distance of 400m this evening at Watford. I hope to run in the low 51's and from there it's on to a few weeks transition before the next season starts in early October. No rest for the bone-idle!